Timmy Valentine

Tucha Ferrut

Tucha's father pulled the station wagon up to the curb outside 17 E. Windmill street and took his black Moleskine notebook out of his jacket pocket. Tucha had seen his father do this a hundred times in his life, maybe more. He opened the little book and as Tucha stared out the car window towards the house and could hear the lead of his father's mechanical pencil scratching. He was crossing out another name. His father carefully put the notebook and pencil back into his pocket and leaned over Tucha to pull up the door lock and then pointed up towards the house. It had been a beautiful house at some point. Sitting on top of a small hill surrounded now by an overgrown garden. The flowers in that garden didn't realize they had lept past any border or boundaries laid out for them. They had worked together to claim the entire yard as their own. The garden was in bloom. Tucha could smell the roses that were busy shoving over the old wrought iron fence. The heavenly odor was sneaking through the small triangular vent pushed open at the front of the passenger side window. He could smell the roses and the scent of decaying leaves at the same time. Dry Maple leaves, leftover from last fall, lay on top of damp leaves from the fall before that were smoldering now under the rose bushes. The combination of scents reminded Tucha of walking in the woods with his mother. Remembering her now didn't bring the buckets of tears it used to. He was able to think of her fondly without sobbing and that, he thought, was a little bit of a betrayal. He would make a mental note to sing to his mother the next time he was walking in the woods near his house. He would sing to her spirit and he was sure she would hear him from where she lived up in the sky and she would smile.